itated a moment, laughed, and said:

"All right."

CHAPTER XVI

THE FLOWER-DECKED TENT

When Socola rose the following morning he determined to throw every
scruple to the winds and devote himself to Jennie Barton with a zeal and
passion that would leave to his Southern rivals no doubt as to the
secret of his stay.

At the first informal reception at the White House of the Confederacy
Jennie had been pronounced the most fascinating daughter of the new
Republic, as modest and unassuming as she was brilliant and beautiful.

After the manner of Southern beaux he addressed a note to her on a sheet
of exquisitely tinted foreign paper, at the top of which was the richly
embossed coat of arms of the Socola family of North Italy.

He asked of her the pleasure of a horseback ride over the hills of
Virginia. He was a superb horseman, and she rode as if born in the
saddle.

He sealed the note with a piece of tinted wax and stamped it with the
die which reproduced his coat of arms. He smiled with satisfaction as he
addressed the envelope in his smooth and perfectly rounded handwriting.

He read the answer with surprise and disappointment. The Senator had
replied for his daughter. A slight accident to her mother had caused her
to leave on the morning train for the South. She would probably remain
at Fairview for two weeks.

There was no help for it. He must await her return. In the meantime
there was work to do. The army of the South was slowly but surely
shaping itself into a formidable engine of war.

The master mind at the helm of the new Government had laid the
foundations of one of the most efficient forces ever sent into the arena
of battle. It was as yet only a foundation but one which inspired in his
mind not only a profound respect for his judgment, but a feeling of deep
foreboding for the future.

Jefferson Davis had received a training of peculiar fitness for his
task. The first work before the South was the organization, equipment
and handling of its army of defense. The President they had called to
the leadership had spent four years at West Point and seven years in the
army on our frontiers, pushing the boundaries of the Republic into the
West. He had led a regiment of volunteers in the conquest of Mexico, and
in the battle of Buena Vista, not only saved the day in the moment of
supreme crisis, but had given evidence of the highest order of military
genius. On his return from the Mexican War he ha